Hemp vest (photographed by Zhao Guohong)

Hemp vest, with ethnic features in Shilin, is made by Yi people who plant raw materials and twist thread themselves and weave with self-made wooden weaving machine. In Yi villages in Shilin area, you can see bundled hemp poles hanging in pine trees on the hillside of the village. This means people are drying the raw material for hemp vest. Dried hemp poles will be soaked in a pond until the skin separate from the wooden part. Then remove the hemp fiber for use after drying. Hardworking Yi women use their spare time to twist hemp thread - when they walk home carrying heavy loads on the back. As hand-made hemp thread is looped, wooden spinner should be used to produce long thread which is not easy to be broken. After boiling with alkali, threads are washed white to be dried for weaving into hemp cloth. The woven cloth is usually five cun wide only and needs splicing and tailoring to be sewn into a vest. Yi women use blue cloth to decorate hemp vest, sew beautiful patterns, and nail special cloth buttons to finish a featured hemp vest. In festivals, women dress in colorful costumes, and men wear good hemp vests - handsome with ethnical features.

Hemp poles (photographed by Zhao Guohong)

Soaked hemp poles (photographed by Zhao Guohong)

Twisting hemp (photographed by Suo Wenliang)

Washing hemp (photographed by Yin Tao)

Drying hemp poles (photographed by Zhao Guohong)

Tearing hemp (photographed by Yin Tao)

Twisting hemp thread (photographed by Suo Wenliang)

Spinning hemp thread (photographed by Zhao Guohong)

Hemp clew (photographed by Zhao Guohong)

Weaving hemp cloth (photographed by Li Kun)